Navneet：徐兵的贵州之旅（1）

三泰虎7月27日译文，收到徐兵发来的精美照片后，我坐下来写一篇博文。头脑闪过一个念头，想要向你们分享这些照片的美丽之处。我希望把博文内容留给读者的想象力。不同的人看同一张照片所引发的思绪是不同的，如果配上说明就会把作者的想法强加给读者。这些照片是一位为了追求美好前途而于1982年离开家乡的男人拍摄的，家乡取得的进步给他留下了深刻印象。

译文来源：三泰虎 http://www.santaihu.com/2014072701.html
外文标题：Xubing's Trip to Guizhou And My Thoughts of Shimla
外文地址：http://creative.sulekha.com/xubing-s-trip-to-guizhou-and-my-thoughts-of-shimla_616632_blog

When I sat down to write a blog after receiving excellent pictures from Xubing, who had travelled around his home province, I had a mind to bring to you the beauty of the pictures. I wanted to leave to the imagnation of the visitor to my blog about what they said. Everyone of us has different thoughts on seeing a picture but accompanied narrative often tries to impose the thoughts of the writer on the minds of the readers. The pictures were taken by the man who had left his village in 1982 in search of better prospects and was impressed by the progress. In the accompanied mail that he sent along with these pictures he spoke highly about the progress in the region. Though the progress that you see here is not much compared with other parts of China but when, we see the formidable hills in the backdrop, the tough terrain in the landscape, you may agree with me that in such testing conditions even little is much.

徐兵回到了他的故乡。收到徐兵发来的精美照片后，我坐下来写一篇博文。头脑闪过一个念头，想要向你们分享这些照片的美丽之处。我希望把博文内容留给读者的想象力。不同的人看同一张照片所引发的思绪是不同的，如果配上说明就会把作者的想法强加给读者。这些照片是一位为了追求美好前途而于1982年离开家乡的男人拍摄的，家乡取得的进步给他留下了深刻印象。在发来的邮件中，除了这些照片之外，他还高度赞扬家乡的进步。虽然你在照片中所见到的进步与中国其他地区的进步相比不大，但是当你看到背景中令人敬畏的山峰和艰难的地形，你也许会与我产生共鸣，即在如此恶劣环境下，哪怕是一点进步也是难能可贵的。

This as I understand from the caption of the picture is a water storage pond for Fire Fighting purposes. A very sensible thing to have for a village in the hills where most of the houses are made out of timber. I once visited an ancient village near Shanghai ( A heritage vilage).There too, the equipment used for fire- fighting in the old days was kept on display. It seems to me that Fire Fighting is an essential part of social duty in China and tradition has been there of community participation, dispensing thus with the need of administration providing for it.

从图片说明得知，那个水池是用于防火的。对于山上的村子来说，由于大多数房子是木头做的，这样做是非常明智的。我曾经参观过上海附近的一个古村落。那里也展示了古时候的灭火设备。似乎灭火是中国社会责任的基本部分，传统上是社区参与，省掉了政府参与灭火的必要性。

I grew up in Shimla which was said to be Queen of the Hills, the moniker given to it by the British- but that queen has been sullied, raped, using the word gang-raped will not be good, so I may say "Mass-raped". Shimla of today is so crowded, congested, polluted that though I live just about hundred kilometres from there, I don't desire to go there. Tears well up in my eyes when I think of the city where my childhood memories are ensconced.

戈顿城堡

我在西姆拉长大，英国给西姆拉取了一个绰号叫“群山中的女王”。但是这个“女王”已经被玷污，被强奸。用轮奸这个词不够给力，应该说是被“群奸”。今天的西姆拉非常拥挤，污染严重，以致于虽然我居住的地方离那里只有大约百来公里，但是我不想去那里。一想到那座充满儿时记忆的城市，我的眼泪就夺眶而出。

Grandeur of Gorton Castle

What brought to my memories the Shimla of my childhood is thought that one by one the old heritage buildings have been gutted by fire. The latest victim, Gorton Castle (Gordon Castle burnt down on January 28, 2014) where my father's office was housed and I would go to him after school. Lady Irwin was the name of the school where I was enrolled in Nursery :). So taking little steps up the slope, I must be going there more than half a century ago breathing cold cedar scented air with my little lungs. The thought even today is very freshening.

烧为灰烬

带给我对西姆拉的童年记忆的是老房子一个接一个被大火吞噬。最近的一个受害者是戈顿城堡（烧毁于2014年1月28日），那里曾经是我父亲的办公场所，我放学后就会去那里找他。“Lady Irwin”是我小时候上的幼儿园的校名 :) 沿着斜坡拾级而上，50年前的我肯定要去那里，我的小肺呼吸着带着冷意的芳香空气。甚至今天，一想到这就精神振奋。

There are no ponds like the above in any hill stations, nor anywhere in any cities in the plains. The Fire Brigade station in Shimla is near Scandal Point. It's not more than five minutes drive from there to Gordon Castle- but location of Fire Station is irrelevant, when the city has no water, nor in all these sixty years, I am sure any proposal for storing it, getting it, must have ever been brought up by the government after government. When there is not enough water for general use, it is foolish to expect to have water stored for fighting fire. The encumbent government in Himachal Pradesh is staving off the charges of corruption by the previous one which has all the more cases of corruption pending against its ministers.

西姆拉皮特霍夫（PeterHoff Shimla），只有记忆留下

山区里没有任何类似的水池，平原的城市里也看不到。西姆拉的消防站离戈顿城堡不超过5分钟的开车距离，但是当这座城市缺水，而且是60年里一直缺水时，消防站的位置就变得不相干了。我确信，历届政府都提出过储水的建议。然而，一般用途的水尚且不足，指望储存一些水来灭火是愚蠢的。喜马偕尔邦的现任政府避开前任政府的腐败指控，后者的部长们面临更多悬而未决的腐败案件。

The incumbent Chief Minister is alleged to have got kick backs by favouring some company for installing power plants while the previous one's son wanted to convert the heritage grounds like Annandale in to cricketing ground for collateral fiancial gains due to escalation of real estate prices. This rigmarole and musical chair between the corrupt politicians goes on in India while the state of affairs continues to become worse. There is not even one city in India which has twenty-four hour water and power supply for not even any one day in a year, not even one.

史诺顿医院（Snowdon Hospital），老的已经烧掉了

现任首席部长被控告偏好某些公司安装发电厂，从中收取回扣，而前任首席部长的儿子考虑到房地产价格飙升，想要把遗产地改成板球场，从而赚取收益。印度甚至没有一座这样的城市，即一年内有哪怕是一天24小时不停供水供电的，一座都没有。

Records with the state fire department say that since independence at least a dozen British-era buildings in Shimla, most of them under government occupation, have been consumed by fire.

消防部门的记录显示，自从独立以后，西姆拉至少有12座英殖民时代的建筑，大多数为政府控制，被大火毁于一旦。

已经被烧掉

The prominent ones include Snowdown Hospital, Wildflower Hall, Kennedy House, Peterhoff, the Western Command Headquarters, Raj Bhavan, General Post Office and US Club Army Mess.

The only thing that seems to have remained intact is the Records of the Fire Brigade, wish I could torch that.

这些著名的建筑包括史诺顿医院、西姆拉野花大厅酒店、肯尼迪宫、皮特霍夫酒店、西方司令部、Raj Bhavan、邮政总局等。

唯一仍然保留完整的是消防队的记录。